nulla
by gustin puckerman
Summary: ONE-SHOT. Read: I just wanted to see if you're not screwing your whole life again. ― Hans/Elsa. Hans-centric, You and the Rest!verse.


**Disclaimer**: Everything belongs to their rightful owner(s)  
**Pairing**: Hans-centric, Hans/Elsa.  
**Genre**: Drama, Family, Romance, Friendship.  
**World /Story Setting**: In _You and the Rest_ verse. Modern. AU.  
**Characters**: I'm guessing a good amount of OCs  
**Rating**: PG-13/T. There will be cussing.  
**Summary**: Read: I just wanted to see if you're not screwing your whole life again.

**Author's Note**: 5,578 words. READ THIS. IF YOU'RE NOT READING _You and the Rest_, then **STOP**. Like seriously. This is an out-take that was set in between Chapter 7 [VII] and Chapter 8 [VIII] of my (currently) on-going fanfiction titled You and the Rest. So, if you're not reading that, then nothing would probably make sense out of this. The only reason I decided to put this in a separate fiction is because I'd like to think that YatR are solely from Elsa's points of view― and I'm very tempted to write something from Hans', and yeah, because I've been kinda desperate to write his brothers (who I've readily constructed a whole fucking background story/history of, like HELL YEAH) because I'd like to dwell more on their strange brotherly-love-hate relationship and the Southern Isles' stories are too good [in my head] to pass it up.

So, if you're still not 'till (at _least_) _VII_ of YatR, **TURN BACK NOW**.

**Fanfic Inspiration**: "_four point one"_ by therentyoupay [a Legend of Korra, Tahno/Korra fiction]  
**Musical Inspiration**: "_Seven Nation Army_" by The White Stripes (because HANS).

* * *

_**nulla  
**_**(the Latin word meaning "none")**

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At one o'clock after midnight, Hans threw his phone right at the mirror down the hall before his brother could even blink. "Bloody hell, you freaking psycho―" Benno had cursed, his feet thumping against the carpeted stairs as he raced to the hall where Hans stared back at his broken reflection, his face now crumpling in pieces. If he wasn't so pathetic, he'd might even find it in himself to say it was artistic.

(Fabian would have snorted, and convinced him even more on how he was right when he proposed that Hans was colour blind when he was barely eleven years old. _Whatever_.)

"Oh man," Benno finally faced him, a short gasp of air exhaled through his lips. He ran his fingers through his long dark brown hair and rubbed his unshaven face. "What―"

Benno stopped then, pursed his lips and finally brought his palms together, "Okay." He drawled, while Hans gathered his raging nerves.

"What the _fuck_ happened?"

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Hans stared at his brother for a _very_ long time,  
somewhere at the back of his mind, something was seeking  
for the correct answer  
but everything that it's produced was another lie  
to save face and time and other petty bits like the shrieking concern  
ignited alive again in their mother's eyes when she sees this, but  
_goddammit_―

he's just so tired of lying.

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So, he decided on the truth.

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(―or at least, as a truth as it can honestly be.)

"I might need a new phone."

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Benno laughed, but there was hardly humour in his eyes.

(He said afterwards, _thank God you didn't wake mother_, but Hans was still staring at the dead phone, now joined with the mirror's broken pieces, hoping that somehow, never mind how impossible it sounded, that it would still vibrated. That it will still buzz. That it will―

It was dead. It was truly, miserably dead.

_Huh_.)

* * *

Hans cradled his chin with his fingers as his attention shifted elsewhere to the garden where the green was illuminated somehow under the beaming sun, his brothers' comments of "_are you still keeping the sideburns?_" flew passed his head and merged into white noises until it became a subtle hum, like how you would pull the volume of your car radio to one that you won't even realise the radio was on, but the music _was there_. It was there.

Though, of course, his brothers' voices would only serve as the lowest quality of music existed, if it were one.

(_"What did you do this time?" A growl escaped from the back of his throat as a nauseating headache attacked across his head, spreading right from his temple to the back where his hairline met his neck. His brother ― Jasper? Benno? Marvis? ― slapped him again, repeatedly. "Wake up." He didn't open his eyes, but he pinched in his expression, and there's an obvious frown across his face, he knew. His brother refrained from slapping him but moved on to shake his shoulders, the force of his palm twisted a knot and there's a hiss before he released an irritated grunt: "I'm awake." He heard his brother cursed, the one who was holding him, but another one snorted from somewhere in the room although the headache made it impossible for Hans to open his eyes and identify where, "Awake? I can see your dick and you're making no effort to―_)

The sound of the pouring tea forced Hans to drag his gaze back his drink, and his hand toppled down to the top of the table for his fingers to reach upon the handle, and his eyes appreciated the cool design of the china tea cup. Gedion have always had the eyes of seeing beauty in the simplest of things, even if none of them ever cared to tell him that. Hans' mind briefly wandered to _her_, and he mused himself with the thought of her liking this. _She would tell him_, he's certain. _She wouldn't mind complimenting others_.

She wasn't any of them.

Thank God she isn't, or he's sure― (_"I'm not sick." He told them, gritting his teeth and locking his jaw. His eyes watched his brothers, desperation was no longer the topic to ridicule as he knew all of them were oozing the exact term they all were too egoistic to admit of having; Marvis was the first one to sigh, palming his face over down his nose. "Hans, you have to understand―" God, he was so tired of hearing that. "I'm not―" He cut him off, the temptation to roll his eyes were high, but he decided against it, "―sick." Marvis sighed again while Benno snorted, "You're a fucking mess." He stood up then, his hands balled into a fist, "What did you sa―" until he was stopped when hands were pressed against his chest, hard, and he was met with Jasper's darker shade of green eyes. "Calm down, Hans. That's not the wisest way to settle this. We just need to wait for Klaus and figure out_―)

"Hello, earth to Hans?" Devon drawled, his handsome face tilted to one side and a playful (annoying) grin spread over his face. "Spacing out is not a good look on you, brother."

Hans' lips nearly went out in a sneer, when Jasper interrupted quickly, his eyes squinting with the summer heat around them: "Are you alright, Hans? You appear a little... _pale_."

"Yeah." Benno rasped out with a mouth full of bread, practically spitting, from besides Jasper, agreeing with his twin brother. "A little blue too, if I may add."

"I'm _fine_." He insisted, though he didn't care to leave out his irritation there, taking a sip of his drink. _I'm fine_.

"Are you certain?" Jasper asked again, and Hans' eyes accidentally fell on Benno's face, and he pondered momentarily on the astounding resemblance of twins between them hadn't baffled him unlike any other people would; Benno stared at him with a glare burning up in his own set of emerald eyes, the haunting memory of the broken mirrors shattered like black dots across his vision and Hans wondered why the older man still hadn't say anything about it.

He pressed his lips together and met Jasper's eyes again, frowning. "_Yes_."

(_Hans wanted to take the dirt and dug his fist into it. He would have, but that would be insane, and the last thing he'd wanted to do was further convince most of his brothers' theory on his mental state, when six months in psychiatric locked up would be the price. And Hans refused to give his family the satisfaction from how great he has fallen. He would not allow himself to live learning his brothers had the last laugh. His eyes scanned over the earth before him, his chest heavy with a kind of depression Gideon insisted he's having. "Father would have been in tears," he laughed, but there were tears of his own building up in his eyes as he stared at the grave with his father's proud name engraved boldly in gold; Bill, standing behind, didn't say anything. Bill was useless._)

"―you're not still dating her, are you?" Devon frowned, eyes focused on Hallfred sitting across from him. "You do realise she's _mad?_"

"She isn't _mad_, she's just..." Hallfred scratched his temple, obviously running out of excuse to defend his psychotic girlfriend, and Hans, for once, let his attention remained on the current discussion, waiting for what's to come from his tenth brother's mouth. It should be interesting, if it's not too pathetic no doubt. Hallfred gazed around hopelessly. "She's got problems. Everybody has that."

"She went into rehab. _Three_ times." Jasper added, his tone pressing.

"She broke your wrist once." Hans pointed out, drawling.

"She didn't―" Hallfred seemed helpless. "She just _twisted_ it. It was an accident."

"She threatened to cut Bill's testicles off." Gideon supplied, only then taking a proper seat down in between Devon and Jasper.

"Oooh, I remember that." Benno chuckled, white teeth lining up as he smiled.

"I've actually enjoyed that." Devon imitated his brother's chuckles. "Man, I should've recorded it."

"Everybody have enjoyed it. Forty-years plus, and all his life only lead up to a raging lunatic threatening to castrate him in his sleep. Who wouldn't have been able to enjoy it?" Hans slurred with his lips touching the edge of his cup, and from the corner of his eyes he saw Jasper chuckled through a lit cigarette while Devon almost toppled over with laughter.

"Sarah isn't a raging lunatic," Hallfred stressed out, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Gideon held a smile to his face, but his eyes were kind through his spectacles as he looked at his younger brother, separated by nine years of age in between them. "If you wouldn't mind, brother, I have friends who are highly specialised in this... _cases_. I could give their cards if you'd take one."

"Take it, for the love of God." Benno bit through his rough-edged voice, but the mocking grin hasn't washed away completely from his face to alert the Southern Isles' brothers that he was being honestly serious. "Make the right choices."

Hallfred gave a subtle glare, and took the ticket Gideon had already offered out, looking reluctant.

"So," Jasper tapped his nails against the table. "Where's the cake?"

Across from him, Devon already had his phone out, both hungry and was surely eager to take a picture from it for his crave to satisfy his needs of filling out personal bits to the world via the web. What a rich hobby. (―_the cool metal did nothing to soothe over his twisting nerves as he pressed it further against the raw skin of his lips, after being grazed over so many times with his teeth. He's checked over his phone plenty times and held it too close to know that another lit to the screen won't alert him of a new message, or a new text ― or anything, fuck it Elsa, fuck it, why are you doing this to me ― but he pressed his thumb over to the side of the phone anyway, brightening up the screen only to be met with the same, sad, empty wall of nothing_―)

Hans stood up abruptly, bringing the bottom of the chair to be dragged across the floor in a terrible screech that would have made Danelius' dead dog whimpered if it were still alive, and all attentions fell on him. "I'll be skipping the cake."

"Yeah?" Benno asked with a sneer, "You got more serious stuff going on?"

Hans was tempted to gift his brother with another of his infamous glare, but decided against it. A part of him ― the one where it's filled with shy blue eyes and bright pink lips; the _better_ part of him ― decided against it, blaming it on the fact that Benno had his shattered phone matter settled without even asking. "If you need me, I'll be in my room."

Jasper stared at him, his dark brows stringing on together. "I thought you said you were fine."

"_Fine_ wouldn't escape me from being tired, and I am that. Simply tired." Hans retorted back, spun on his heels before any of his brothers could attack him with further questions and made his way inside the large mansion. It wasn't Southern Isles _per se_, but it had the whole interesting comfortable home-like concept, if the concept pointed heavily on how rich they were. Hans sighed, and suddenly was very aware of the empty breast pocket where his phone used to be at; he gritted his teeth.

When he finally sank down on the bed, his tired muscles finally revealed how worn they were and Hans thought back of the excuse he gave to his brother, and how appropriate (read: accurate) it was. His eyes shut tight.

* * *

For the most part of the afternoon, Hans slept. (Or, at least, he tried to.)

It wasn't much about the matter of escaping reality or finding solace during slumber; it was much more rather frank than that. He simply wanted to _forget_.

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But then again, Fate's always been a bitch.

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"Look at her, Hans. Look at her."

Eric's eyes were suddenly burning through him and Hans felt a dreaded sense of guilt clawing at the back of his throat as his emerald eyes fell where Eric's set his vision upon.

"What are we, like _fourteen?_" Eric suddenly retorted back, yanking his attention back from the faded blonde. "I thought you promised that we'll grow up and things won't get as fucked up."

Hans felt a scowl shaping his expression. "Well, I'm sorry I didn't end up being a fucking psychic."

"Nice, Hans. Fucking smooth." Eric, clearly and obviously, ignored him; his sight returning back to a place a distance away from there, but Hans refused to let his gaze averted elsewhere, a glare hardening upon his features. "Look at her."

He was staring at his hands a second later even though he had no idea why, and somehow, it was bleeding, and there were shattered mirrors everywhere. Eric was besides him still, and his face was pinched in this determined expression when his fingers plucked one of the broken pieces. "Well, then―" he asked, the kindness of his nature removed from his tone of voice, but he was still there, Hans thought. He hadn't left just yet. "Are you going to just stand there, or actually help me up here?"

There were seriously damaged by then, the mess, he could tell (―and he thought this was appropriate somehow, how they ended, because he couldn't remember much of the middle, but the end though. The end was important. The end always rounded up to be the same damn thing: all broken and blood and things in pieces and―)

"Okay. Nothing we couldn't clear up." Eric breathed out, his fingers perfectly clean but he looked tired. There were dark rings under his eyes when he tilted his chin up to Hans, mentally nudging for some kind of respond. "Right?"

He's still glaring at his 'dearest' cousin, feeling left out somehow (like it all made sense, yet it doesn't and― and he knew that Eric knew how much he hated it. _What the fuck is he on about this time_― "Doesn't matter. Still a fucking mess."

"It isn't hopeless." Eric forced out, pressing on the issue. His face saddened, somehow. "If there's hope, it's not."

He was about to ask the raven-haired what he meant by that, but then there was a crash. A mute, but devastating crash, leaving a nasty impact on his left side and it went on too quickly ― too fast ― and then all he heard was _her_ voice, and he didn't imagine a dark-blonde at this, he imagined a platinum-blonde, with all her glory and all of her downfalls and Eric's voice ran for the last time: "_It's not hopeless._"

(She was screaming "_No!_" as he went to his doom; he didn't know if the case was that he didn't catch her quick enough, or if _she_ didn't reach to him first.)

―the crash had him jolted to an abrupt wake, where all he was met with was an empty, dark room. He gasped and swallowed for reality, suddenly too desperate, his mind reeled backwards.

(And _that_ dream was only the beginning.)

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"Is that all?" She asked, the tears reflected sadly on the lights around them against her blue eyes, and her lips trembled. "Is that what you wanted to hear? There you go. I've said it. Just― leave. _Please_."

The way she said it, the way she's looking at him, like he's done worst than what he did (_have he?_) torn him up inside and he blinked, because his eyes needed time to take in _this_ side of her: the way her platinum-blonde hair glittered (_fucking glittered!_) and the blush on her cheeks faded away. "No, wait―" he said, voice raspy and uncertain, and he frowned, reaching up to her; she's on her way by then, a painful distance away from him with each steps, and he managed out: "Elsa. Where are you―"

"Don't you get it? Just leave me alone, okay?"

He stopped when she's turning to face him again, and under the lights he noted how her skin looked paler. He shook his head ― _what was going on_ ― and acknowledged the sick feeling nestled at his stomach at her request, his eyes threatening to give out a wolfish glare, but as much as he wanted to proof how excellent he was at pushing her away (and God, why her? _Why her?_), he didn't want that right now. He tugged his brows together though, his mouth curled in a familiar frown, "Whoah, wait. What's happening here?" He looked at her, _searched_ for her. "What are you― what's happening? What did I― what did you say?"

"_God_, Hans." Her voice came out like a weak plea, and his heart broke, just a little. "Don't let me repeat it."

"Repeat _what?_"

She laughed, the one that fuelled up his irritation, because this was not her― _she's not like this, she didn't laugh like him, no, not like this, this wasn't her_― and fixed him with a teary (broken) glare. "You're not _that_ dense, are you?"

"Elsa. I don't―" He gritted his teeth, and swallowed. _Hard_. "I don't understand. What's happening? Tell me. Properly, if you may."

"You're unbelievable." She spat back, darkly.

"I―" He opened his mouth, suddenly _desperation_ was an understatement because he was still grasping on whatever reality he'd bounded them on but all his train of thoughts lead to one and he rasped it out: "Don't, don't run." It _burned_ him, the need he had when he blurted it out, but he chased her away once. He won't chase her away now. "Don't run. Elsa." Their eyes met. "Don't leave me."

"What do you want from me, Hans? A parade? An official letter?" She asked, a little screeching on her behalf, and his stomach toppled over in the most negative way because _she did not screech_. Something must have driven her to the extreme if she was acting such way (and was it him? It couldn't be. He was just another manipulator, and to _think_ that he wasn't even manipulating _her_, he means―).

_I want you_.

"I can't do this anymore."

"No." His hands suddenly enveloped her arms, and she's gasping ― shocked, most likely ― clearly hadn't expecting such a bold action on his part. "You don't mean that. You don't."

She's trying to wiggle her way out of his grasp, but all she succeeded was having his hold her with a tighter grip. "Let go of me, Hans."

"Tell me all this time meant _nothing_ to you." His eyes must have been wide, he knew. And he shouldn't be doing this. He shouldn't be working so hard to get her (but that was it with her, wasn't it? It wasn't that he wanted her so bad because there's a mean to achieve at the end, it was that because there _wasn't_. She's far too smart, too fragile, and it would have been _delicious_ to play her, but he didn't. He didn't because―) "Look me in the eyes and tell me," it's hard for him to say it, but then: "Tell me you haven't got attached. Not just a little bit."

Her eyes welled up in more tears. "Give it up, Hans."

"Elsa."

And then, she'd touched him. She touched him so gently ― her thumb over his wrist ― and just like that, his arm fell helplessly to his side and Hans felt like he was a child again, whirled back to the moment where Benno had rejected him from playing '_slay the dragon_' with them because all the spots were taken, and there's no where to turn to, no one to share his childish needs of attention with. It was just him. And the constant feelings of "_What's so wrong with me― how was that I've never been enough?_"― and when he looked up, the hurt in her expression was as clear as the day, as painful as those dark moments were. His stomach sunk.

"I'm sorry."

_Defeated_. That was how he felt. Utterly, miserably defeated.

She hugged herself, stepping backward, but paused there, as though she's still waiting for his next move. He wondered if it would be better if she'd walk away. Would she want him to chase her? Probably not. "I―" He started, suddenly words weren't enough for him, and she stared back, biting on her bottom lips, like she always did whenever she's not entirely certain, but thinking deeply of it. He was tempted to quirk out a smile at that. "I wish we were better."

She didn't say anything, not at first. "There's..." Her eyes drooped sideways. "There's a 'we'?"

"There isn't?" He retorted, and it echoed in a hollow, empty way. She shuddered.

"I don't know, Hans." She told, shaking her head, brows furrowing together. "I'm confused."

_Well_― he wanted to say more, stay a little bit longer, _finally_ have this talk with her, no matter how confused he was too about this matter, but at least_ they'll talk it out_ but he was suddenly running out of time when he was pulled into another reality, and other noises from other places came flooding in and then she was just an image, blurring away, losing its focus (and he's calling back, "_Elsa! Elsa!_" but she kept on distorting, like a scene from a movie corrupted with an old CD and there wasn't anything anybody could do) and all he could painted out was a single tear.

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And then there was his small body, helpless and weak, staring at a dead spider he just killed with the sole his shoe. He was six.

(He was scared of spiders: couldn't stand them, but one of his brothers had put it in his room in the morning ― everywhere! ― and his father's been just a little bit far out of reach, mother's too busy to pour a little attention and brothers too cocky to give a little help  
and it was just him.

_Just him_.)

That was the cruelest dream out of all.

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* * *

"You haven't eaten anything since morning."

He wanted to say that that was a lie, that he did ate something that morning (―a freaking toast? What was the fancy name again? Never mind that he only took about, what, two bites? _Snorts_. Who cares anyway―) but all he did was stared back at the ceiling, and ignored completely of the haughty presence lingering about by his doorframe. There was an agitation by the back of his throat tempting him to growl out something like, "Go away," because― _why the fuck do you care?_ but he said none of that too, because it didn't matter, will it?

(Did it ever matter?)

Plus, Benno did this once too, _ignoring_. Shouldn't be an area he would felt foreign about.

"Jesus, man." Benno drawled, the familiar trade of arrogance birthed from being apart of the Southern Isles' family plastered over his frustrated exhale of air, but Hans merely rolled his eyes at it. "I'm not a fucking idiot. I traced all your recent calls. The fuck you got yourself into this time?"

_Fucking bastard_. Hans gritted his teeth and shut his eyes. "Shouldn't you have other important matters to―"

"Not if you're losing your marbles, I'm not." He could hear the way Benno dragged his boot across the carpeted-floor, cursing inwardly at the tips of his tongue though he just couldn't say it (―just go away, when did you care anyway, damn it, I'm not losing _anything_ for God's sakes, just fucking―), and when he opened his eyes, Benno was looking straight at him, his rough exterior complexion made him looked washed down than the rest of them, but Hans knew Benno was more than what his reputation held. Everyone was more than what their reputation held. Hans swallowed; Benno stared, "Seriously, though. Are you alright?"

"Does it matter?" He echoed, his eyes sharp against Benno's harsh ones.

"Yeah, it does. It would be nice to learn that none of my family members are certified _crazy_, dammit." Benno blew a heavy breath out, his fingers tugged on his long hair. "Who's she, Hans? Is she―"

"Fuck _no_." He cuts his seventh brother off immediately, because even the _thought_ of his brothers comparing her to... He gritted his teeth and clenched his jaw, focusing on his heart rate and his breathing. (―keep your head calm, don't let them see through your―) He returned his stare to Benno, hoping that there wasn't much of a crack through his expression. "She's not like that," he said, lower in volume, and he knew it somehow: _he meant it_. "She's never been like that."

"Then, who the _hell_ is―"

"Doesn't matter." He repeated, his tone harshened because _it doesn't_. Nothing entirely mattered now. "It's not like I'll be talking to her anytime soon. It's over."

"And why's that?"

"Why do you care?" Hans chose to reply, deepening his frown.

"Because―" Benno paused, and his eyes were trained elsewhere, seeking still for the right answer and Hans almost chocked up with a knowing snort. _Why does anyone care_. No one cares in this family. Not really. Benno finally sighed out, fingers rubbed against his temple and he sat down at the edge of the bed. "Why―" Benno started, "why is it so hard for us to give a damn about each other? Why is it such a big deal?"

And though Benno didn't say it, Hans could almost make up his next question: _why aren't we like real brothers?_

"We're such damnation, Hans." Benno said more, and he dropped his shoulders. "Sometimes a little humane wouldn't hurt the soul."

"What―" Hans squinted his eyes, his chest felt heavy and his windpipe suddenly closed in. "What do you want from me, Benno?"

"Don't you get it?" The older man laughed, but it was nothing but a helpless cry. "I just wanted to see if you're okay."

(Read: I just wanted to see if you're not screwing your whole life again.)

Hans chose not to answer.

* * *

Hans dreamt of kissing her lips again, his thumb brushed over her swollen pink lips and she's smiling a little as she pointed out at the messy lipstick smudges she'd left on his mouth, and she told him, "I want you, Hans. I want _you_."

And he blinked, and he looked at her again (_fuck it, Elsa, why are you so blurry? And can you truly hear me?_) and husked out, "How did you find me here?"

"Eric," she said, and pushed him again, and then he's holding her weight against him and their bodies were crushing together and she's nipping on his neck and he's straining out a groan and, "Hush, Elsa, or they'll hear" and her fingers trailing down his torso, _squeezed_, knuckles dug deep against his skin and her mouth slanted over his again.

But― "Elsa." As much as it pained him (fucking killed him) to stop her, he did. "This isn't right. You need to hear―"

She cut him off when her kisses left fiery trails over his skin and he swore his breath caught when she spoke, "No. Not now. I don't want to hear it, Hans." She breathed, and her breath was hot against his flesh and he tightened his grip over her hips, slowly grinding them together (she moaned when he gave a sudden jerk in between, and his teeth accidentally fell on the side of _her_ jaw)― she said more, "I just want _this_."

Fuck it. "Elsa," he called, because this was wrong, but it felt so _fucking right_ but― "I'm sorry."

And then: "No."

He opened his eyes, and they were suddenly a mile apart, but she's also so close. Her eyes held up the tears, but it fell down her cheeks and met under her chin until it dropped off, and her lips trembled. "I told you not to say it, Hans!" She half-yelled, fear swallowing her figure and he cursed himself. _All this time_.

He tried to warn her, didn't he? Warn her to not get attached, though not directly. And now it's all too much, and she can't bare it. _But_, he bit his tongue, he could help, couldn't he? He could. Just―

"F―_fuck_."

He sat up almost immediately, the blanket around his body fell over his hips helplessly and he breathed out― eyes wide and alert and _what the fuck_― he looked around, and suddenly he knew where he was, and what happened. _Just a dream_, he told himself, planting his face against his palms, evening out his raging thoughts. _Dreams?_ He heard himself snarled. _Try a freakin' nightmare_.

He brushed it off, finally.

It didn't matter.

(― he thought, he's _so_ tired of thinking that way, because why hadn't it mattered? It should be, he wanted it to be, but it wasn't. And _it wasn't_. And what was he hoping for? _Looking_ for? This was stupid. This was ridiculous. Nothing really matter, and this pain will never stop and maybe he should just―)

He searched for his phone, but then realised he didn't own one, not then, and dropped his body back to the mattress. Though this time, he was careful not to fall asleep.

(Keep it together.)

* * *

"You know what I would do?" Devon nudged him, while they were waiting for their cars to arrive and Hans deliberately refrained himself from rolling his eyes too hard at his eleventh brother's wide grin. "I'd go after her. Even if it's for the final time."

"What―" Hans arranged his sentences, annoyed. "―are you talking about?"

_Damn, Benno talked, didn't he?_

Devon shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest, no phone in sight (he kept it away when Hans rejected to take a 'selfie' with him for the umpteenth time), wiggling his brows at him. "You deserve to tell it from _your_ side of things. I don't know if it'll be much help, but it would make it clear, at the very least, somewhat. Do it, you fail or you don't, it's whatever; that way it'll be easier to leave it all behind. No regrets."

Hans was half-reliefed Devon didn't phrased out 'YOLO' as an addition. Still, he couldn't help himself: "Shut up."

"I'm just saying." Devon pressed out, his eyes glinted under the summer's sun. "_Try_."

Hans kept his glare forward.

* * *

And she mattered, didn't she?

More than he'd wanted to admit; more than he'd ever calculated.

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("_So, dammit, Hans. What are you sitting around here for? It's been a full week._")

He finally moved.

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**End Note**: Yeah, I know. What the _fuck_ was that? Total mind-fuck from Hans' side of the story? HELL YEAH.

(_So, uh, reviews would be nice_.)


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